Mark Hess/Ed Campion
Headquarters, Washington, DC November 1, 1994
(Phone: 202/358-1778)
Debra Rahn
Headquarters, Washington, DC
(Phone: 202/358-1639)
Kyle Herring
Johnson Space Center, Houston
(Phone: 713/483-5111)
RELEASE: 94-182
ASTRONAUT SEGA TO REPLACE READDY AS NASA MANAGER IN RUSSIA
Astronaut Ronald M. Sega, Ph.D., will replace Navy
Captain William F. Readdy as the NASA manager of operational
activities at Star City, Russia, near Moscow.
As Director of Operations, Russia, Sega will support
training and preparations of NASA astronauts at Gagarin
Cosmonaut Training Center (GCTC), Star City. He will be the
primary interface between NASA and the GCTC Russian
management, coordinating all training and other operations
involving NASA or contractor personnel in Star City.
Sega will continue to establish operational and personal
relationships with Star City management and the cosmonauts,
which are pivotal to successful, long-term joint operations
involving NASA, the Russian Space Agency (RSA) and GCTC. He
also will participate in personal training designed to
acquaint astronauts with the operational aspects of Russian
vehicles and training facilities.
Sega's other primary responsibilities will include
support of astronauts and their families currently living in
Star City. He will routinely monitor the current training
program for astronauts being trained for flights to the Mir
Space Station and will also continue development of training
curriculum for U.S. astronauts training for joint missions
aboard Mir.
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Sega will join fellow astronauts Norman E. Thagard,
M.D., and Bonnie J. Dunbar, Ph.D., who have been training in
Star City since February as the prime and backup crew members
for a three-month flight aboard Mir. Thagard is scheduled to
be launched aboard a Soyuz spacecraft in March 1995.
Following his stay aboard Mir, the crew of Shuttle mission
STS-71, which will include Dunbar as a mission specialist,
will dock Atlantis to Mir. It will be the first of seven to
ten Shuttle visits that will be made to the Russian space
station during the 1995-1997 time frame.
Sega, 41, flew on Discovery's STS-60 mission in February
1994, the first joint U.S./Russian Space Shuttle mission.
The mission carried the Wake Shield Facility and the Spacehab
pressurized experiment module.
Sega received a doctorate in electrical engineering from
the University of Colorado in 1982.
Readdy has flown on two Shuttle missions, STS-42 in
January 1992, and STS-51 in September 1993. Readdy has
served in Star City since August 1994 and will return to an
assignment in the Astronaut Office at NASA's Johnson Space
Center. He is a captain in the U.S. Naval Reserve and a 1974
graduate of the Naval Academy.
-end-
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